President-elect Barack Obama has offered the nomination of Secretary of Health and Human Services to his close ally Tom Daschle of South Dakota, the former Democratic Senate leader who was an early supporter of Mr. Obama’s run for the presidency.

this is an interesting choice – my preference would be for someone with a more practical health background (but when was the last time we had that, really?), but at least daschle’s been involved in the ongoing discussion about our nation’s health care system.